Hidden in last week's law to reopen government at existing funding levels and raise the nation's debt is a provision raising the cap on allowable spending for the Olmstead lock and dam project on the Ohio River in Illinois to $2.9 billion from the current $1.56 billion.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has been working for 25 years to install a replacement set of locks near the confluence of the Ohio and Mississippi rivers.
The measure does not appropriate funds, but allows work on the project to continue. The Army Corps informed the Inland Waterways Users Board in August that the Olmstead project would be shuttered in November, and 400 jobs would be lost if Congress did not raise the cap.
The Water Resources Development Act reauthorization passed by the Senate, a companion bill pending in the House and the fiscal year 2014 Energy & Water Appropriations bill all raise the cap, but none of them will become law before the project would have shut down. The Senate bill would fund three quarters of Olmstead work through approporations and the balance with money from user fees to avoid the requirement that 50 percent of the money for waterways projects come from the Inland Waterways Trust Fund. Currently, the Olmstead project is siphoning all its contributions from the trust fund.
The Army Corps has said that if Olmstead work had to cease, it would cost $40 million to restart the project.
The Waterways Council, citing Army Corps pronouncements, said the project has a 7.4-to-1 cost-benefit ratio and is estimated to save more than $10 million annually in transportation costs for barges.
Conservative watchdog groups are upset about the authorization, suggesting it is an earmark obtained by Sen. Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and Sen. Richard Durbin, D-Ill.